By Patrick Wintour* – The Guardian
World Bank joins CNN and Financial Times in pulling out of kingdom’s showpiece investment event
A high-profile investment summit in Riyadh later this month is rapidly becoming a fiasco as prominent businesses and media groups pulled out over Saudi Arabia’s alleged involvement in the disappearance and possible murder of the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
The president of the World Bank, Jim Yong Kim, said he would not be attending, soon after the Financial Times, CNN and CNBC withdrew as media sponsors.
The world’s business elite were due to attend the Future Investment Initiative (FII), which begins in the Saudi capital on 23 October. However, some of the companies involved say they are withdrawing pending the outcome of investigations into Khashoggi’s disappearance, while others have pulled out unconditionally.
Saudi Arabia’s ambitious Vision 2030 project – the brainchild of the kingdom’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman – is strongly dependent on overseas investment, and the apparent shunning of the prestigious FII conference will be as disturbing to Saudi policymakers as the more distant threat of a US-imposed ban on arms sales.
Jamal Khashoggi is one of the Arab world’s most prominent journalists and commentators. He is an outspoken critic of Saudi Arabia who has dared to defy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom’s de facto ruler.
While living in Saudi Arabia, Khashoggi was told to stop writing or posting on Twitter, where he has more than 1.6 million followers. He moved to the US more than a year ago, where he continued to comment on his country both in print and on television. He wrote columns for the Washington Post and the Guardian.
His message struck a nuanced tone in the US, where he tried to acknowledge the reforms undertaken by Bin Salman while also highlighting the flaws.
Khashoggi previously had close links with the Saudi royal family, including having served as a media aide to Prince Turki al-Faisal, when the latter was director general of the Saudi intelligence agency.
He is also a former editor of the Saudi newspaper al-Watan and had worked with Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a grandson of the first Saudi king who was detained last year as part of what the authorities said was an anti-corruption campaign.
The New York Times withdrew its sponsorship of the event on Wednesday, starting a domino effect of withdrawals from across the globe.
In a short statement the Financial Times’ chief communications officer, Fiona McDonnell, said the newspaper would not be a partner of the conference while Khashoggi’s disappearance remained unexplained.
Media figures to pull out of the conference include Ariana Huffington of the Huffington Post, the LA Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong, and the CNBC anchor Andrew Ross Sorkin, who announced he would not attend before the broadcaster followed suit.
The Viacom chief executive Bob Bakish and Uber chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi have also confirmed they will not attend.
“I’m very troubled by the reports to date about Jamal Khashoggi,” Khosrowshahi said in a statement late on Thursday. “We are following the situation closely, and unless a substantially different set of facts emerges, I won’t be attending the FII conference in Riyadh.” Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund is a major investor in Uber.
Sir Richard Branson has halted discussions with Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund about a planned $1bn investment in Virgin’s space companies. He has also suspended his participation in two advisory boards.
Christine Lagarde, the head of the IMF, is listed as a speaker at the conference. Jihad Azour, head of the IMF’s Middle East department, would not say if she would attend. “Like most of the people here and everywhere we are waiting to have more information on this recent development,” Azour said.
The Economist’s editor-in-chief, Zanny Minton Beddoes, has withdrawn from the FII. An editorial in the latest issue contained a rebuke to Bin Salman, stating: “His brutish handling of even mild critics is overshadowing more admirable policies, which include curbing the religious police, letting women drive and encouraging them to work.
“As his regime starts to resemble an Arab nationalist dictatorship – socially liberal but centralised, paranoid and built on fear – his promise of a new, tolerant Saudi Arabia is receding.”
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Jamal Khashoggi case: sponsors urged to pull out of Saudi conference
By Patrick Wintour*
Economist joins New York Times in withdrawing from ‘Davos in the Desert’ event
The sponsors of a major Saudi investor event to be held in Riyadh later this month are facing calls to end their involvement in the conference after allegations were made about the kingdom’s connection to the disappearance and possible death of the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
On Wednesday the New York Times pulled out as media sponsor of the conference, known by participants as “Davos in the Desert”, to be held at the same Ritz-Carlton hotel where crown prince Mohammed bin Salman last year jailed dozens of wealthy Saudis in what he said was an anti-corruption campaign.
The Economist’s editor-in-chief, Zanny Minton Beddoes, who had been due to speak, also pulled out of the event. In an editorial published on Thursday, the magazine said that Bin Salman’s regime had started to resemble an Arab nationalist dictatorship – “socially liberal but centralised, paranoid and built on fear”.
The US Treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, will represent the Trump administration, while other prominent figures scheduled to take part are Jamie Dimon, the chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, Stephen Schwarzman, the chief executive of the Blackstone Group, and Dara Khosrowshahi, the chief executive of Uber.
Other media sponsors of the Future Investment Initiative, scheduled to take place between 23 and 25 October, include the Financial Times, CNN, CNBC and Bloomberg.
A range of consultants including Deloitte and McKinsey are also acting as conference partners.
The New York Times’s decision to pull out was announced late on Wednesday by Eileen Murphy, a spokeswoman for the paper. The Washington Post has challenged US media groups to explain whether they wished to be associated with a country accused of killing a prominent journalist. Many media firms responded to say they were monitoring their position.
The Bahrain human rights group Bird said in a statement: “The New York Times pulled its sponsorship to the Riyadh conference. It’s time for business and the Financial Times to follow suit. An attack on one journalist should be considered an attack on all.”
Bird has also called on the trustees of the Natural History Museum in London not to provide the museum as a venue for the Saudi Arabia annual national day celebration, organised by the Saudi embassy, and called for a protest outside the building. The museum said no member of staff would be speaking at the event and the decision was a commercial one that would gain valuable income for the museum.
The pressure to pull out of the conference could grow in the days ahead if Saudi Arabia fails to provide convincing answers on Khashoggi’s disappearance.
Turkey has accused Saudi Arabia of killing Khashoggi or transporting him against his will back to Saudi Arabia. Intelligence reports, largely sourced from the US, suggest Bin Salman had been seeking to lure Khashoggi back to Riyadh.
The Saudi ambassador in London, Mohammed bin Nawwaf bin Abdulaziz, has so far declined invitations by the BBC to give an explanation on behalf of the Saudi government for Khashoggi’s disappearance since 2 October.
Tony Blair, a supporter of the Saudi modernisation programme, said the Saudis needed to offer credible explanations for what had happened to Khashoggi. He described the situation as very serious.
The Financial Times has taken a critical line on the Khashoggi affair, saying the crown prince needs to provide the world with answers.
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*Patrick Wintour is diplomatic editor for The Guardian
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